PSPCA to evacuate and disinfect city shelter

A rare and deadly illness struck the city's animal shelter in June, killing six dogs. Three others were euthanized after showing signs of infection. The outbreak forced a quarantine at the Pennsylvania SPCA facility on West Hunting Park Avenue.

Last month, a Labrador retriever at the shelter in Hunting Park died of the same virulent infection - Streptococcus zooepidemicus, or "strep zoo" - prompting more drastic action.

PSPCA officials said last week they were planning a "population break" - emptying the shelter of dogs - in an effort to eradicate the disease.

After last year's outbreak, the PSPCA treated all the animals at the shelter with antibiotics and disinfected the former warehouse.

The same strain of strep zoo killed the three-year-old chocolate Lab last month, agency chief executive officer Sue Cosby said.

"It could be we never completely eliminated it from the building," she said.

Symptoms of strep zoo, which can be confused with canine influenza, include cough, runny nose, and fever. In severe cases, dogs bleed from the mouth and nose.

The plan, which Cosby expects to be finalized this week, calls for removing all the dogs from the shelter and placing them with animal-rescue agencies across the region. For two days, the building will be disinfected and degreased from top to bottom.

When finished, only new dogs will be admitted.

"It's a massive, massive operation," Cosby said. "But we felt a complete break was our only real option.

"I'm unaware of any other shelter of this size or in any other city that has tried anything like this."

Population breaks at smaller shelters have often involved euthanasia of many of the animals. That is not part of the PSPCA's plan, she said.

Health issues have plagued the shelter for years. Before Cosby became CEO, she worked for an animal-rescue group in South Jersey that pulled animals from shelters across the region. Illness was so rampant in 2008 that her group stopped taking animals from the Philadelphia shelter, she said.

Bill Smith, founder of Main Line Animal Rescue, said the situation in Philadelphia had not improved.

Smith said that of the 300 dogs and cats he had taken from the PSPCA in the last year, virtually every one had some form of illness, ranging from mild upper-respiratory infection to strep zoo.

"Everything that comes out of there is sick," said Smith, who estimates his Chester Springs shelter spent $300,000 treating PSPCA dogs and cats last year.

One PSPCA dog taken to Main Line Animal Rescue in December with kennel cough caused an outbreak at the shelter that killed two previously healthy dogs.

The building itself is apparently at the root of the problems affecting the shelter.

It lacks adequate air circulation and a quarantine area where staff can isolate incoming dogs, said Michael Moyer, the Rosenthal Director of Shelter Animal Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine.

"It's all one big common airspace," Moyer said. "If one is interested in lifesaving, one would be hard-pressed to end up at that design."

Melissa Levy of the Philadelphia Animal Welfare Society rescued 2,200 animals from the shelter last year. She said she expected most of the rescued animals to be sick. She also blamed the building.

"It was not built to house animals," she said. "When the city established it as an animal-control shelter, they paid no attention to how the building needed to be outfitted.

"It's a hotbed for disease," she said. "The problems are not going to go away. The PSPCA is doing what they can do, but they're working with a sick building."